He gurgles.
I ease up. Fractionally.
"Theater," he wheezes. "Stage. The cage."
I drop him.
Behind me, Raf is standing over the second guard, the man's own gun in Raf's hand, ejected magazine in the other. He tosses both in opposite directions.
"Go," Raf says.
I go.
The double doors are fifteen feet ahead. Someone kicked them open already. One door is hanging from a single hinge, the other caved inward with a bloody boot print stamped into the metal.
Rex'sboot print.
I'd know it anywhere.
But between us and those doors, the corridor branches. A second hallway shoots off to the right, and there are footsteps coming from it.
More. Fucking. Guards.
"Raf—"
"I hear them." He's already pivoting, planting himself at the junction, his body filling the corridor like a wall. "Get to Bells."
"I'm not leaving you!"
"Phoenix." His dark eyes lock onto mine, devoid of the bravado and cockiness that would usually be there, which scares the shit out of me. "Get to our girl."
The footsteps get louder.
I grab Raf's shoulder. Squeeze once. Hard.
He nods.
I run for the double doors.
Behind me, I hear the first guard round the corner and Raf's voice, low and chuckling darkly.
"Wrong fuckin' hallway, amigo."
The sound of impact.
A body hitting a wall.
I don't look back.
CHAPTER 36
REX
Bells isnotdying in a fucking cage.
The thought cuts through the haze of blood loss and pain. The kind of clarity that only comes when everything else has been stripped away and the animal at the core of you gets to speak.
I have to move.